The next planetary defense mission

The risk of comets exists and the risk of asteroids too, we have news about the asteroid Apophis, on July 16 the European space agency announced that its space security program authorized the preparatory work for its next planetary defense mission. It will be the Apophis rapid mission for space security whose short name is Ramses because Apophis is the Egyptian God of chaos, so another name of the Egyptian God is used for this type of Mission, Ramses is going to meet Apophis and accompany him in its safe passage, although very very close to the earth; On April 13, 2029, Apophis will literally brush against us, if we understand that it will also brush against the layer or the Sphere that we have of satellites orbiting the Earth because Apophis will pass on April 13 about 32,000 km away, some say 31,000 or so but well out there and that is within the orbit of some space satellites.

The important thing is that the researchers want to study the satellite as the Earth's gravity alters its physical characteristics because that close pass, which everyone agrees on, is that it will alter the trajectory of Apophis, luckily Apophis is not Too large, it is about 375 m in diameter, it is a respectable size. In the event of an impact with the earth, it would cause a regional disaster, but it would not be the Apocalypse, nor the end of the world, nor would it destroy the planet as some media outlets say that it would apophysis. It's a planet killer.

The important thing is that detail, in 2029 it will pass very close and will be visible to the naked eye. The astronomers' calculation is that it will be visible to about 2 billion people located in much of Europe, Africa and parts of Asia, apparently it will not be visible from America; It is going to be an extraordinary step, it is not normal for an asteroid of this size, which, although small, is already a respectable size to pass so close. They have calculated that this only happens once every 5000 or every 10,000 years and it is a time to investigate what is going to happen to it, and what is going to happen with its trajectory, since this asteroid will end up changing its trajectory due to the close passage of the Earth.

To cause a truly global disaster we should be talking about asteroids several kilometers in diameter, it has a size that we can act against it, with that size we can destroy or break it or divert it because we already have technology, it was already done with the 160-meter Didimos asteroid. m in diameter and its trajectory was diverted thanks to an impact, that asteroid continues to orbit its largest asteroid, but with that impact we have managed to move it and change the orbit it had a little so we have the technology to do it in case it really comes on a collision course with Earth, it is not a giant asteroid.

By the way, it is not the only mission, it is not the only ship that is going to go to meet Apophis, we also have OSIRIS-APEX, a NASA ship that was previously Osiris REx, the one that visited the asteroid Venum and I would not be surprised if The Chinese will also send a mission to the Apophis asteroid because, among other things, we do not have to send the ship very far. In short, the year 2029 will be very interesting.